


Smile Like You Mean It

by ricochet



Category: Prince of Tennis
Genre: Gen
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2005-12-03
Updated: 2005-12-03
Packaged: 2017-10-05 20:56:03
Rating: Not Rated
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 609
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/45951
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/ricochet/pseuds/ricochet
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>Fuji has had better days.  Taka has no problems with this one.</p>
            </blockquote>





	Smile Like You Mean It

Fifteen minutes after he woke up, Fuji Syuusuke decided that today sucked. Before dinner last night, Yuuta had called to say he was spending the upcoming break at school, and Fuji had slept badly. A quake during the night had knocked over a large framed photo which had landed on one of his cacti. He was forced to kiss the picture and the cactus good-bye when he realised the broken glass had ripped holes in both of them.

Ten minutes after he arrived at schoool, the rest of Fuji's class was quick to agree: Today sucked. Eiji took one look at his expression and curled up in his chair with his notebook held like a shield. The rest of his classmates were less subtle in their reactions. Fuji kept smiling.

Five minutes into afternoon practice, Tezuka was frustrated enough to give him laps, and Fuji was repressing the urge to rip his friend a new place to store his racket handle. He had made it around the courts twice when Taka-san fell into stride next to him. Fuji turned his head and smiled up at him just the way he had been smiling at everyone all day.

Taka-san smiled back.

Fuji turned his eyes front and kept running.

Fuji finished his laps first and came back onto the courts, smiling. Practice did not improve. He smiled at the freshmen, and they scattered. He smiled at the non-regulars, and they paled. He smiled at Inui, and Inui broke his pencil. He smiled at Echizen, and Echizen snarked at him before ducking away for the other side of the courts. He smiled at Tezuka, and Tezuka assigned him doubles practice with Taka-san.

Fuji smiled at their opponents.

Kaido hissed, and Momo stuttered when he said, "Let's have a good game."

Fuji smiled at Taka-san.

Taka-san smiled back. It was warm and steady. Taka-san grabbed his racket, and then they played tennis.

When it was finished, Momo and Kaido were not quite a greasy smear across the court, but it was a close thing. Off to the side, Eiji was alternately laughing at the still bickering second-years and making a point of keeping his own doubles partner between himself and Fuji. Oishi was pretending not to notice.

Fuji was breathing hard, and there was a fine tremor in his right arm he decided to blame on returning one too many of Momo's stronger shots. There was no reason he could bring to mind for that tremor to be moving from his arm into his shoulder blades, and from there, down his back. It had been as a good match as he could have expected from Momo and Kaido, and on any other day he would be smilingly pleased with the result.

He was not smiling now.

He kept his eyes closed against the glare of the sun and tried to feel the faint breeze on his face instead of the sweat pasting his jersey to his back. His hair was stuck to his forehead, and today, piled on top of everything else, it moved from a mild irritant to a reason to be truly angry. Tezuka was an idiot for setting him a match that would only be of passing interest instead of wearing him out properly.

The hand that grasped his shoulder did not startle him, and the strength of the grip brought Fuji's attention back to the world around him. Heat from a broad palm soaked through his jersey, and long fingers squeezed firmly without digging in. The tremor faded into nonexistence.

Fuji looked up at Taka-san's flushed and slightly embarrassed face.

Fuji smiled.

Sweet and unafraid, Taka-san smiled back.


End file.
